Passport
and Tourist VisaOn the plane, you will be issued
a tourist card, FM-T, which is stamped by officials as you pass through
customs inside the airport terminal. The airline will then collect the
tourist card when you leave Mexico. An actual visa is not required unless
you are staying in Mexico for over 180 days. Avoid carrying the tourist
card or your passport with you while in town, but keep them in a secure
place in your room or in the hotel. If your passport is lost or stolen,
a copy of the tourist visa can help the consulate to process your replacement
documents. It's probably a good idea to have a complete photocopy of your
passport and your other important identification documents with you while
traveling.

For U.S. citizens, proof of citizenship
and photo identification are required for entry into Mexico. A U.S. passport
is the simplest way, but other citizenship documents such as a certified
copy of a U.S. birth certificate, a naturalization certificate or a certificate
of citizenship are also acceptable. You should be prepared to present one
of these documents as proof of citizenship along with some type of photo
identification.

Canadian citizens will need to travel
with their passport, or else with a Canadian birth certificate and a picture
ID such as a drivers license. Other foreigners, if in doubt about the entry
requirements, should check with a local Mexican embassy or consulate. For
with the most recent United States State Department
Consular
Information Sheet for Mexico

Airport/Airport TransportationThe Puerto Vallarta Gustavo Diaz
Ordaz airport is located approximately six (6) miles north of downtown.
Near each airport exit is a set of taxi booths where you should purchase
your tickets for transportation into town. It is recommended that you take
a taxi which brings you directly to your lodging.

The arrival area
of the Puerto Vallarta airport has made some changes which can be confusing
to the first time visitor. When you depart Customs with your luggage you
will walk through an enclosed area - the people in this long hallway are
salespeople for the many time-share resorts in the city - just smile, say
no thanks, and keep walking. These folks will often promise anything from
a free taxi ride or tour to actual cash (we locals call this area the 'shark
tank'). All of this is part of promotion to buy a time-share condo and
the sales presentation would take away several hours of your precious vacation
time. Keep walking through the automatic double glass doors straight towards
the airport doors which go outside and near these Exits are the taxi
booths.

You should pay for your taxi directly
at one of these specified taxi booths and not to any individual taxi driver
- you have been advised! The vans from the airport carry up to eight persons
and often make multiple stops, so it's best to take a taxi, unless your
entire group rents a van. Vans and taxis will quite often now know the
locations of the Puerto Vallarta gay hotels,
bed and breakfasts and of PV's many condos and villas (not to mention the
numerous
Vallarta gay clubs & bars), but
it's still a pretty good idea to have the address of your accommodations
and a phone number handy with you. Also, taxi prices around town are fixed
and set by zone; be sure to ask before you get in.

Travel Tip: Discovery Vallarta
and Diana DeCoste of Diana's Gay Tours now recommend a preferred VIP transportation
service for clients when arriving in Pto. Vallarta. A gay-friendly VIP
Representative will be waiting by the luggage claim and will also meet
you again once you pass customs to escort you to your driver. The price
is $24 USD per car for 1-2 people (depending on luggage). A van is available
for larger groups for $10 USD per person. Payment made directly to the
driver. Please visit Diana's Puerto
Vallarta VIP Transportation Service for complete details on this service.

Puerto Vallarta Tourist Office
-
The Board supplies free maps, brochures and travel information. There are
two offices, the main Puerto Vallarta Tourist Bureau is downtown at the
old City Hall (Presidencia Municipal) on Juarez street near the downtown
Guadalupe cathedral, open Mon-Sat, 8am-8pm and Sun, Noon-6pm, Tel: 222-0242
and other at the Secretary of Tourism at 1712 Avenida Medina Ascencio,
on the 3rd Floor Mon-Fri, 9am-5pm. Contact them at Tel: (52-322) 224-2939
or Fax: (52-322) 224-0915.

Puerto
Vallarta Safety & Tourism - Is Puerto Vallarta safe
for tourists? Puerto Vallarta, Mexico is a relatively safe city, especially
in the tourist areas such as the North Side-Marina hotel district areas,
Downtown, and the wonderful South Side-Romantic Zone where most Puerto
Vallarta gay bars and clubs, fine restaurants,
and gay hotel-lodging are located. I
would advise using the same security and safety precautions you would use
in traveling as a tourist to any new city or foreign country: keep valuables
and your passport in a hotel safe or stashed away in your condo or gay
hotel room; don't wear expensive watches and jewelry; carry around only
a fairly reasonable amount of cash, perhaps in a money belt; avoid making
ATM withdrawals late at night; don't flaunt or display substantial amounts
of cash or valuables - be modest; and exercise caution in any unfamiliar
part of town. In a word: Stay alert when out and about. Travel tip:
Be extra aware of your possessions (particularly your camera, wallet and
cell phone etc.) at the Puerto Vallarta gay beach and bars, particularly
if and when you invite someone back to your place. You've been advised.

The city puts considerable resources
into keeping Puerto Vallarta safe, secure, well lit and clean for tourism.
I've walked in many different parts of Puerto Vallarta at various times
of the day and night over these 19+ years and largely felt safe. I don't
think that tourist safety is a major negative issue in the town. Here's
an interesting and reasonable perspective entitled Personal
Safety in Puerto Vallarta by Linda Ellerbee. And it would never occur
to me to ever use the adjective 'dangerous' as a word to describe Vallarta.
Furthermore, the US State Department in its advisories about Mexico says,
"There is no evidence that U.S. tourists have been targeted by criminal
elements due to their citizenship."

How safe is it to travel to Puerto
Vallarta? Thomas Dale & Associates, a global investigative and
security firm, released in May 2011 a study commissioned by the Puerto
Vallarta Tourism Board which concluded that Puerto Vallarta "is one
of the safest tourist destinations for international and national tourists."
Overall the study found that visitors to this popular straight and gay
travel destination felt safe and continue to visit Vallarta numerous times
through their lives. As I would have expected from my personal experiences
living half my adult life in the US and the other half here, the Puerto
Vallarta Safety study said that "the number of negative events involving
foreigners or non-foreigners is fractional" compared to the large expatriate
resident community population size and the approximately 1.5 million American
and Canadian visitors who come on holiday every year to Puerto Vallarta.
So I believe you can pretty much rest assured that your vacation to Puerto
Vallarta, Mexico will be relaxing, enjoyable and safe.

SpanishSpanish is the official language,
but don't worry, English is widely spoken in Puerto Vallarta. If you do
know some Spanish, so much the better! People in town will appreciate your
efforts and it will make establishing friendships that much easier. If
you'd like to learn some basic Spanish vocabulary about dining, directions
and numbers before your visit to Mexico, you can visit the Travlang web
site Foreign
Languages for Travelers. Note: If you do want to learn some Spanish
while you are here, you can get in touch with Leonardo Tejeda, who teaches
beginners to advanced students. Contact him at leomar@usa.net or Tel: 223-4784
or 044-322-294-2565 or with Melchor's
Spanish school, contact Senor Melchor Cortes, from USA cellular: 011-52-322-118-0822
or local Tel: 224-8917

WaterThe water leaving the purification
facilities of Puerto Vallarta has been certified for well over 10 years
as among the best in all of Latin America. However, the city's piping is
sometimes rather old, so it's best not to drink the tap water. Purified
water is available in all hotels, bars and restaurants, which all use purified
ice as well. Because you're in a tropical climate, it's advisable to drink
at least 4-5 glasses of purified water a day to help prevent dehydration.
Bottled water is sold in most stores. Some Puerto
Vallarta condos, hotels and villas have filtration systems, so you
might want to check.

FoodFood service quality has greatly
improved in town in recent years. You can be pretty confident that the
food in Puerto Vallarta restaurants is
washed in purified water and/or properly cooked. Follow some simple rules:
choose cooked food, eat in restaurants that are popular and watch your
alcohol and coffee intake. As an added precaution, you may want to avoid
salads and peel all fruits and vegetables or at least wash them well -
though I personally don't think that's necessary anymore (it was indeed
good advice 15-20+ years ago). As the old saying used to go: boil it, cook
it, peel it or forget it. Use the lemons served in restaurants as the juice
has antibacterial properties.

HealthIt's possible you may eat or drink
something that isn't quite right while on vacation. If you experience diarrhea,
there are several ways to treat it. Avoid anything that will further irritate
your stomach such as alcohol, sodas or coffee, and drink plenty of purified
water to replace lost fluids. Pepto bismol is a time proven relief for
diarrhea.

Most pharmacists can recommend the
proper medicines, which are generally inexpensive and effective. You don't
need a prescription in Mexico for many drugs (except now for antibiotics
and of course, controlled/narcotic substances) and a trip to the pharmacy
will usually suffice for most traveler's complaints. There are many good
doctors in Puerto Vallarta. Discovery Vallarta recommends Dr. Maria Guadalupe
(Lupita) Lewgot, Tel. 223-0444 and her office is at the Medasist Hospital
located at 358 Manuel Dieguez street on the South Side in Puerto Vallarta.
See below or go for further updated travel information on PV hospitals,
medical services and other Puerto
Vallarta emergency numbers here.

Month

Average High

Average Low

Average Precipitation(inches)

January

80

62

0.8/0.9

February

80

62

0.2/0.3

March

81

63

<0.1

April

82

65

<0.1

May

85

70

<0.1

June

88

76

5.9/6

July

89

76

10.3/10.4

August

90

76

11.1/11.2

September

90

76

9.4/9.5

October

89

74

3.4/3.5

November

85

69

0.5/0.6

December

81

65

0.6/0.7

Puerto Vallarta
Yearly WeatherPuerto Vallarta, Mexico enjoys well
over 280-310 days of sunshine per year and basically has two seasons. From
November until May is the dry season, when rain is rare, the sky relatively
cloudless and the nights mild. The daytime temperature ranges from 78-85
degrees Fahrenheit and can drop down to 55-60 degrees at night during the
"high season" winter months of January and Febraury. The temperate sub-tropical
climate, comparable to that in Hawaii, is one reason people flock to Vallarta.
You may want to bring long pants and a light sweater for the cool winter
evenings. Go to the new Puerto Vallarta weather page
for more complete info including an updated climate chart, and here for
some further
gay travel tips and advice.

The rain normally starts right on
the money in mid-June and increases in frequency and duration until there
are often daily downpours July through September, usually in the late afternoon
or at night. The rains continue into October, really tapering off around
the middle of the month. It is hot and muggy. The summer daytime temperature
is 88-93 degrees every day and 75-78 or warmer at night. There is little
underground drainage, so streets become streams during the tropical summer
rains, which are quite intense at times. Total rainfall in Puerto Vallarta
amounts to a fairly substantial 45-60 inches a year.

Because of the favorable topography
of Banderas Bay, which is shaped like a gigantic horseshoe opening to the
Pacific Ocean on the west, Puerto Vallarta is generally protected from
hurricanes in the late summer and early autumn (early July-mid October)
that pass up the coast and either swing out to sea or continue on up toward
Baja California. Only once in the last 40+ years or more did Puerto Vallarta
suffer serious damages in certain parts of town, in the neighborhood of
$100 million, when Hurricane
Kenna (go to link for photos and info) passed by on the morning of
October 25, 2002.

Traveler's ChecksYou many want to carry a supply
of American Express or VISA traveler's checks with you to Mexico. They
are usually accepted at banks, stores and hotels, though I believe that
most Casas de Cambio/Money Exchange places will no longer accept travelers
checks (due to more stringent regulations attempting to control money laundering),
especially ones from Canada. If you lose or misplace your checks, contact
the carrier after referring to the Handy phone numbers section below.

Money and Money ExchangeThe currency in Mexico is the peso.
The bills come in 20, 50, 100, 200 and 500 peso notes and they are quite
colorful, attractive and of different sizes. Coins are in denominations
of 5, 10, 20 and 50 centavos and 1, 2, 5 and 10 pesos. 100 centavos equals
1 peso. All items sold in Mexico are priced in pesos. The current international
exchange rate is quite variable these days, around 13.0-13.5 pesos per
dollar and fluctuates daily. Go here for the
Universal
Currency Converter and the current rate. For the very best exchange
rate use your ATM card at any of the many conveniently located banks or
ATMs in town and pay for your purchases with a credit card.

Banks have an exchange window usually
open Mon through Fri, 9am-1:30pm where you can buy pesos with dollars or
traveler's checks. Many of the Money Exchange or Casa de Cambio places
on the streets of Puerto Vallarta offer slightly less for your dollar than
the banks but are open into the evening hours until 9-10pm and are quite
convenient and widely used. They accept cash but apparently no longer or
rarely accept traveler's checks. The stores, bars and restaurants will
often exchange money but at a fairly lower rate, so I would advise against
doing it that way. Hotels give the least favorable/worst exchange rates.
Travel
tips: Be sure to count your pesos whenever changing money. Exchange
rates are usually clearly posted, but if they are not be certain to ask
beforehand.

Post OfficeThe main Puerto Vallarta Post Office
(Servicio Postal Mexicano) is located downtown on 1014 Colombia street
between Argentina and Venezuela streets near Hidalgo Park (Parque Hidalgo).
A letter or post card to the US or Canada costs approximately 10.50 pesos
and may take up to several weeks to arrive as all international mail goes
first to Mexico City. If you buy anything bulky or valuable, ask at the
store about shipping as they usually ship more direct via FedEx or DHL,
though this can be costly. Post Office hours, Mon-Fri, 8am-6pm and Sat,
9am-1pm. Tel: 222-6308.

TaxisThere are somewhere around a 1,000
taxis in the city of Puerto Vallarta. They are a relatively cheap and convenient
mode of transportation and getting around town, especially after 11:30pm
or so when the buses stop running. Most tourists take taxis as a simple
matter of convenience and 'saving time'. Ask the driver how much your trip
is before you get in, because some taxi drivers will try to overcharge
tourists. Be advised that there are restaurants that will pay taxi drivers
a commission for bringing clients. If your driver wants you to try a restaurant
other than the one you have selected, it may be self-serving advice. Locals
and ex-patriates have found over the years that most drivers are friendly,
honest and knowledgeable about the city and know at least a bit of English.
Many drivers now know the names and locations of the Puerto Vallarta gay
bars, the gay hotels, guesthouses and the Blue Chairs gay beach on Los
Muertos, but it's still a good idea to carry your accommodation's name
and address along with you. Puerto Vallarta is divided into taxi zones,
prices are fixed by the local union, and fares go anywhere from 30-40 pesos
within a particular zone up to 80-120 pesos (from the Marina to the South
Side-Olas Altas area, for example). Coming in from the airport is the most
expensive as it is the federal zone, at around 240 pesos; but the return
trip to the airport is about half that at most. Many hotels will post the
current taxi fares, so do ask.

BusesPuerto Vallarta buses are cheap,
costing 6.5 pesos or about 50 US cents to get just about anywhere in the
city. The buses are sometimes rather run-down, but you never have to wait
long before the next one comes along! Stops are marked by a blue "parada"
sign which has a bus outlined on it. You may find yourself being entertained
by locals who hop on the bus to do a clown act, play guitar, or perhaps
two 12 year old boys singing about their lost loves, all for a few pesos
tip (giving you a chance to practice your generosity).

To get to the gay bars from the hotels
on the north end of Puerto Vallarta, be sure to take buses marked "Centro"
or "Olas Altas". The bus will pass by several of the gay bars such as Anthropology
and Paco's Ranch before turning around at Lazaro Cardenas Park on the South
Side or heading back through the tunnel. Most buses run regularly from
approximately 6am to 11:45pm. To go to Conchas Chinas, Mismaloya, Boca
de Tomatlan or any of the South Shore accommodations along the way, buses
leave from Basilio Badillo street at Constitucion street on the South Side,
7am-10pm and cost around 7 pesos.

Motor vehicles generally have the
right of way in Mexico, not pedestrians. I don't want to sound like your
mother, but buses in Puerto Vallarta are noted for traveling at excess
velocity, so extra care should be used crossing the streets here.

Buses to locations located north
around Banderas Bay such as Nuevo Vallarta, Bucerias, Punta de Mita and
Sayulita leave from the ATM terminal which is located at 1410 Brazil street
near the sports stadium. These Autostransportes Medina de Puerto Vallarta
buses stop across from the Sheraton
Hotel, Coppel, and in front of Walmart
on their way north out of town.

Inter-city buses leave from the main
Puerto
Vallarta Bus Terminal or station (known as the Central Caminonera)
which is located just north of the Puerto Vallarta airport. Buses leave
to Guadalajara about every half hour and to other major cities every hour
or two during the day and there are at least 4-5 main carriers. Mexico's
long distance bus system is top notch and probably envied by much of the
world. Regular services link all major cities day and night. Networks of
shorter routes reach almost every corner of the Republic. A bus from Mexico
city to Acapulco costs less than the toll charges for a private car. The
National Chamber for Passenger and Tourist Buses estimated that the 40,000
buses owned by its members have about 3.5 billion passenger movements each
year.

DrugsDrug offenses are risky business
in Mexico. Mexico's drugs laws are sometimes more reactionary and ridiculous
than those of the States, though the Southern states and Texas probably
take the cake. Under Napoleanic law, you're guilty until proven innocent.
If you must, be extremely discrete; if you're caught, you may be deported,
have a prison term or have to pay a fine. Police occasionally stop and
frisk locals and tourists, checking for drugs. For gay guys this might
likely occur at night in the area near the gay bars CC Slaughters and Paco's
Ranch. From what I have heard and read, penalties now tend to be rather
lax in Puerto Vallarta, a good thing. If you are stopped and feel that
you have been mistreated in any way, please call your consulate
to report the incident and lodge an official report/protest. Travel
warning: Police have been known to extort money if they find something
on you, so beware. Get the patrulla/patrol car number on the side if you
have a run-in with the cops. My impression though is that with the relatively
new nationwide 2009 drug decriminalization
laws for small amounts of drugs for personal use, the local police
in Puerto Vallarta don't spend much time or energy worrying about small
time use.

Siesta TimeMost Mexicans eat their main meal
sometime between 1pm-4pm, so some shops and government offices are closed
(usually from 2pm-4pm). This is a sensible custom in a tropical country
and gives the body and mind a chance to rest during the hottest hours of
the day. The stores that observe this custom are open afterwards until
around 8pm or 10pm. Puerto Vallarta bars and restaurants stay open during
these siesta hours.

TimeshareThe sale of timeshares has unfortunately
become a big business in Puerto Vallarta. On nearly all the streets of
the city frequented by tourists there are timeshare stations or offices.
The salesperson or "OPC" will invite you to a free breakfast and promise
gifts or discounts on a cruise, tour or jeep rental in exchange for your
time at a "presentation" at the hotel or resort. Salespeople at this "presentation"
will sometimes use high pressure or misleading tactics to induce you to
buy their product. Unless you are really interested in buying timeshare
in Vallarta, it is advisable that you pass these people by and continue
on your merry way

Help with Dialing Local area code for Vallarta is
322, followed by the 7 digit local numberTo call Puerto Vallarta from the
US or Canada 011 + 52 + 322 + local number To call direct to the US or Canada
dial 001 + area code + local number To call direct within Mexico dial
01 + area code + local numberTo call International, Operator
Assisted, dial 090To call direct International dial
00 + country code + area code + phone number